Tag: individuation

Arachnophobia – symbolic of our fear of disconnection?

After lunch, I headed over to the teaching room for the start of sessions. I picked out a chair from the circle placed around the room and sat down. As I waited for my fellow students to arrive, my thoughts turned to my conversation with Karina. Her remarks on the symbolism of spiders as told by the indigenous tribes of the Amazon, was both encouraging and intriguing to me.

I’ve always had a professional fascination with the fear of spiders. In my counseling work, I’m aware that treating arachnophobia requires a different approach from other phobias and irrational fears. The therapeutic technique I use from Energy Psychology methods has its own distinct protocol. Furthermore, when it comes to irrational fears, arachnophobia beats all. Interestingly, it is the most prevalent phobia in the Western world—yet apparent not so within indigenous cultures.

What is it about spiders that puts them top of the scary things list?

Why is this phobia such a significant part of the human condition?

Our Western rational minds cannot figure this out. Our fearful response to spiders far outweighs their inherent threat to our survival. After all, the majority of spiders are quite harmless and their physical presence is hardly an imposing one—unless they gang up of course.

My 95-year-old mother-in-law has a phrase she uses for when she thinks you are making fun of her – “Are you poking Charlie at me?” – she will say. It probably originated as a latter-day distortion of the verbally less genteel “poke bogey,” a colloquialism for “poking fun” in use at the turn of the 20th Century. Charlie Hebdo has a long history of poking Charlie at religious and political institutions. Satirical journalism is what the Charlie Hebdo magazine is all about. But is satire good for us, even if it offends another’s beliefs?

The answer to the above question is ‘yes’—as I will explain later in this three-part post. First though, let’s look into the reaction of the majority of human beings to this Parisian Mass Event other than the initial abhorrence.

Much of the furor in response to the events in Paris of the last week revolves around the issue of “Freedom of Speech,” or as the French have it, “Liberté d’expression.” This post goes into the spiritual origins of this issue and how our Freedom of Expression is a sacrosanct principle underpinning our existence in the physical world. In the spirit of the theme of this Blog, I will also attempt to uncover the deeper message contained within this and other “acts of terrorism” of late as it pertains to our Shift in consciousness.